Writing a whole book of personal memories or family history can feel overwhelming. Here’s a suggestion that could help: You don’t have to wait till everything’s ready. You can start writing now, one story at a time, using a blog.
A Blog Helps You Gather Memories
A blog is a great place to gather memories for your book:
- You can blog one memory at a time as it comes to you.
- The sequence of stories doesn’t matter on a blog.
- Blogging builds a writing habit without pressure.
- You can experiment with voice, tone, point of view, and writing techniques on a blog.
- Writing a simple blog post will help you dig into your memories or family stories.
- You’ll start to notice which stories mean the most to you, and it might not be the ones you expected.
- As you blog, you’ll notice how stories fit together and how one story leads into another.
- A blog post can help you connect several random snippets into a meaningful reflection.
- A blog can be easily shared with family, if you want. Or you can set your blog to be private if you’re not ready to share it yet.
Blogging Can Be Simple
With a blog, you can write just one memory per post. You don’t have to worry about how to introduce the post or wrap it up. Just tell the story, share the memory.
As you write, you might notice a theme or thread that ties it all together, and you can wrap up with that observation—or not. If it happens, grab a hold of it. If not, just post the story by itself.
You can jump around in time on your blog. Today, you might be inspired to tell a story from your early childhood. Tomorrow, you might feel like writing about your first job. That’s okay. Write where you have inspiration and momentum. You can connect the dots later on.
You can mix and match topics on your blog too. Maybe you’ll be writing about a visit out of town when you were a teenager. The next day, you’ll be writing about an aunt who opened a local business.
These memories might go into the same book or different books. One story might go into a book while the other remains a blog post. The important thing is you’re writing your memories or telling your family history. You’re gathering memories that you can draw from as you put together your book.
Write Simply—And Simply Write
The key is to write simply, start telling stories and sharing memories. You can use a blog to gather these memories. If you don’t have a blog, you can write and collect short documents on your computer (be sure to save a backup). The main thing is to write what’s on your mind today, and see how the pieces fit down the road.
Here’s a simple step to take this week: Write about a specific memory. You can write just a paragraph. Or write more if you feel inspired. Don’t worry if it’s “good enough” for a book. It’s a book-building block, and it absolutely counts.
Write simply, and simply write. Tell the story as it comes to you. Don’t worry whether or not that memory will end up in your book. It’s a piece of your story. It’s part of the process. And it’s helping you make progress, to share something of great value to future generations.
Janet Eriksson 